Jāṭ,Jatpeasant caste of northern India and Pakistan. In the 1960s early 21st century the Jāṭ Jat constituted about 20 percent of the population of Punjab, nearly 10 percent of the population of BalochistānBalochistan, RājasthānRajasthan, and Delhi, and from 2 to 5 percent of the populations of Sindh, Northwest Frontier, and Uttar Pradesh. The 4 four million Jāṭ Jat of Pakistan are mainly Muslim by faith; the nearly 6 six million Jāṭ Jat of India are mostly divided into two large castes of about equal strength: one Sikh, concentrated in Punjab, the other Hindu.

The Muslim Jāṭ Jat in the western regions are organized in hundreds of groups tracing their descent through paternal lines; they are mostly camel herders or labourers. Those of India and of the Punjabi areas of Pakistan are more often peasant proprietors. The Jāṭ Numerically, Jats form the largest percentage of the Sikh community and therefore vie for leadership of the faith with urban Khatris, the group to which all 10 Gurus (spiritual leaders of Sikhism) belonged. Some scholars attribute Sikh military tradition largely to its Jat heritage.

The Jat first emerged politically in the 17th century and afterward, having military kingdoms such as Mursān Mursan in Uttar Pradesh, Bharatpur in RājasthānRajasthan, and Patiāla Patiala in Punjab. Their sense of group solidarity, pride, and self-sufficiency have been historically significant in many ways. During the rule of the Mughal emperor Aurangzeb (late 17th century), for example, Jat leaders captained uprisings in the region of Mathura. A Jat kingdom established at nearby Bharatpur in the 18th century became a principal rival for declining Mughal power, its rulers apparently seeing themselves as defenders of Hindu ways against the Muslim Mughals.